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Bee Weaver Apiaries - delivery

I ordered and paid for package bees from them in early December.

They e-mailed in early April that delivery would be between 4/25 and 4/27. On 4/24 they e-mailed that the truck from Texas was in Nashville. On 4/26 they e-mailed that my delivery in upstate NYwould take place on 4/27.

At noon on 4/27, they e-mailed there would be no delivery. They could offer no approximate date when they would re-ship. When I e-mailed that we had spent lots of time and money making arrangements to be available for bees the snotty reply was "we're not reponsible for your personal problems".

It's my first venture into beekeeping, as I am trying to revive an old apple orchard, but I truly thought the hard part was going to be managing the bees, not the people around the bees.

Which Weavers did you deal with? R. Weavers or B. Weavers? I have done business in the past with R. Weavers and was very pleased with them, I once lost a couple of packages in transit and they were replaced no problems.

The Busy Bee teaches two lessons: One is not to be idle and the other is not to get stung.

If you call suppliers Like R. Weavers or Gardner’s out of GA. And inquire, if they don’t have any available ask to be put on a list for cancellations orders. I once got a couple of packages late in the season that way.
I highly recommend Gardner’s their 3 #package bees are $58. they sell Italian’s I bought 10 packages last year all survived the winter in robust condition all gave me a surplus honey crop last year. Very nice bees to work with.
Their phone number is 912-367-9352 they don’t do internet orders you will have to talk to someone.

Last edited by Brent Bean; 05-16-2008 at 05:16 PM.

The Busy Bee teaches two lessons: One is not to be idle and the other is not to get stung.

I ordered queens from B. Weaver that were supposed to come this week. I received an email that they also sent to last weeks customers apologizing for the delay. If they haven't filled last weeks orders, I know that I'm low on the totem pole.
I understand that things can get out of whack in a business run by nature, but it's hard to deal with a company that deals in nature and doesn't come through.
I'm going to take the high road and assume that if business is going bad then they need my support. I can combine my queenless hives and make splits later on if I have to.

Unfortunately, I don't think I am going to get any bees this late in the season. The apple trees, blackberry bushes and $400 worth of bee "stuff" will have to wait for next year.

Don't give up so easily. If Weavers don't come thru, then get busy making some phone calls to other suppliers. It's not too late in the season. For our local (Indiana) bee producers, nucs are just now becoming available. I'd guess the same is true for New York. Are you connected with a local bee club? Find out who produces nucs in your area. Call all the local clubs within a reasonable distance:http://www.masterbeekeeper.org/resources/beegroups.htm

In 2004, I got nucs in June that built up enough for a small surplus (and they had to draw 15 frames, because it was my first season) so don't give up! If you get them in the next month, you could still have a small harvest.

Bee Weaver

Try for some nucs and get your bee's this year. I barely got mine in time to get to my apples. I didnt get the apricots or plums since they had already bloomed. Around here its just been too cold for them to get nucs out early this year. I cancelled one order due to the date being past my bloom time. Good Luck on your bee's

newberlinbee:
there is something in regards to your post that makes sense and some that does not...

first I was unaware that bweaver shipped directly by truck. most of my experience has been with them delivering product via the us postal service. I do see that their current price list suggest that they have had problems in the recent past with shipping.

just to completely inform you... I do know that the 'operation' of bweaver (their spring operation in texas) is in new hands this year and the response you indicated does sound a bit more like the new manager than any of the principles of bweaver. if you still have their phone number in hand for your order I would make a call and ask for Laura (Weaver) and tell her 'ET' suggested that you direct your concern directly to THE BOSS. and please do inform me of how that goes.

They e-mailed in early April that delivery would be between 4/25 and 4/27. On 4/24 they e-mailed that the truck from Texas was in Nashville. On 4/26 they e-mailed that my delivery in upstate NYwould take place on 4/27.

Re. B Weaver, this is the first year that they are trucking the bees themselves which may have accounted for the last minute cancellation.

Since I work for a trucking company, this is my guess as to what happened. They were dropping off packages as they were going up to NY. An opportunity appeared where they could unload all of the remaining packages before getting to NY. They took it instead of paying the fuel to get all the way to NY. In other words they maximized their short term profits at the expense of their long-term profits.

I donít know why they think they could deliver packages cheaper than a common carrier or a trucking broker. They may be using a broker to get freight to bring back to the Houston area to pay for their return fuel. Otherwise I canít see how this would be cheaper. They sure did pick a bad time to get into trucking.

B Weaver

I've dealt with them for 4 years and never had a problem. Last year Binford drove out from his house in town to the warehouse at 10 pm to package up a dozen queens that his office staff forgot to leave on the warehouse steps for me (I was driving between Houston and San Antonio and made the 50mile detour to ensure the girls were well cared for).

If you ask to talk to Laura she'll call you - she is very nice, but she lives in Austin and is not at the warehouse where the shipping goes on. I think she married one of the Weaver sons or grandsons. I don't know about new management this year, I did fall requeening and had very little winter loss so I didn't buy bees this year. The patriarch, Binford, is getting up there in years and prefers to work with the bees rather than work in the office.

I know this business can be unpredictable and they sometimes have late wet springs that delay the build-up or queen mating. If they had a problem I'm sure that it was more the exception than the rule.

Last thing to note is that B Weaver has been running a no-treatment program on their queen stock for a number of years. It shows in the bees I bought from them. He incorporated SMR stock and bred for virus resistance. They've supposedly had the virus resistance tested. Anyway, I've gone from 90% winter losses 5 years ago to 8% this last year.

"Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes"
Henry David Thoreau, Walden

We are new beekeepers and ordered Allstars from B Weaver. My husband placed the order over the phone with Laura Weaver and called back the following week to make sure a queen was ordered. This was in early March, and I was afraid we might be disappointed or do something terribly wrong and kill the bees.

We live in North Texas, and Spring can be anytime after late February. We have already had our first 100 degree day of the year.

I received an email that they might be arriving later in May, and called B Weaver to make sure . I was very surprised to speak to Mr B Weaver himself, and he assured me they would arrive on time, but they have had some situations.

He was very nice and explained that the bees shipped to individuals travelled via US PS and shipping in Texas has been problematic in the past, but the bees that went out of state were transported differently.
I picked them up at the Post Office on a Thursday morning, misted them with a bit of sugar water, and put them in their new home later that evening.

They are hard at work, and we are adding 10 more frames in a couple of weeks. I will probably reorder next year.

Proximity

It is my first attempt at beekeeping. Based on what I have been reading, I think that it may be best to find suppliers that are closer to my location.

However, with any business there will be occassional mishaps or errors. How the business responds to those errors speaks volumes about the business. As a business owner for the last 18 years it would never occur to me to be rude to a customer when I failed to deliver; and I live in NYC where rudeness can sometimes be a more than a hobby!

Bee Weaver's Side of the Story

Dear All, Spring of 2008 was the first year we hauled our package bees to customer areas for pick up. We worked around using USPS (our only option for package bees) as a delivery method and had fewer DOAs in 2008 by over 1/2. It was an overall success. The only hitch in the 2008 deliveries was our truck was stuck in a 4 hour construction caused traffic jam in the middle of the day during one of the hauls---without ventilation some of the packages perished or were heat damaged. They were not suitable for delivery and customers were notified immediately, and informed a replacement shipment would be made as soon as possible. This particular customer found our estimated delivery time frame "unacceptable" and asked that we be more "creative" in our delivery so I could give her a precise date. Because of the nature of package bee production---weather and bee health dependent, because of travel time by truck and USPS variables I could not meet the customer's requirement for an "exact delivery date" and offered her a full refund which she received. We fill thousands of orders and rarely have to cancel a scheduled order---we only choose to do so if we feel it is impossible to meet a customer's special requests or if a customer is threatening in their communications to us. If anyone has any further questions concerning this situation we I will be happy to answer them.